My mutterings on life, thoughts and actions.

LGA Annual Conference

This week I went up to Manchester to attend the Local Government Association annual conference. I had been invited up to be part of a panel to talk about “Digital Councillor”. Alongside very distinguished Councillors in the Social media world, including David Harrington, Alison Hernandez, Anthony McKeown and Simon Cooke, led by Tim Cheetham. We discussed the issues surrounding the use of social media and some of the tools and tips.

The Speakers at the Digital Councillors Event

There were a number of questions raised, particularly the use of social media by council officers (yes it should be encouraged), as well as should you be allowing comments on your blog (yes, employ moderation but don’t be afraid of criticism).

It was intresteing to see different views on different media, Alison Hernandez dropped a digital bomb by saying she didn’t believe in blogs as she used Audioboo. That’s something I’m going to have a look at, particularly because David highlighted a service that will create an audio file of a blog post.

I also decided to play with my IPhone and Panoramic Photos. The following photo was my view, which looks cool, until you start looking at peoples faces – in particular Davids…

All in all a good session, and conference. I will add more links to this post as I get them!